Here Comes The Rain Again
by charleygirl
Summary: Trapped by the weather, Christine visits Erik and finds that rain isn't so bad after all.


**Author's Note:**

Some Erik/Christine fluff which grew too long for _Beyond the Green Baize Door_.

_Die Fledermaus_ (_The Bat_), by Johann Strauss II, premiered in 1874.

* * *

><p><strong>HERE COMES THE RAIN AGAIN<strong>

It was still raining.

Christine glanced out of the window for the third time in as many minutes and gently ground her teeth in frustration. Lowering black clouds had been hanging over Paris since the early hours, depositing a constant deluge onto the city's grimy buildings and unfortunate inhabitants. The weather did not encourage a cheerful demeanour, and was particularly irritating today as it was Sunday and therefore the only day of the week that the opera house closed. She had been hoping to spend it out of doors, perhaps walking in the Bois or just sitting beside the river, anything that allowed her to breathe fresh air and forget the constant rehearsals for _Die Fledermaus_. Thanks to the machinations of Carlotta, Christine was relegated to the part of Adele, the maid, while the prima donna murdered the lead role of Rosalinde. Erik had been complaining about her butchering of the part all week, in those moments when he hadn't been cursing the managers' choice of a Strauss operetta in the first place.

Desperately, Christine looked at the sky again, hoping that there might be a chance that the sun was trying to break through. She was disappointed – there was not a speck of blue sky to be seen amongst the grey, certainly not enough to make a sailor a pair of trousers. She whirled away from the window and sat down heavily on her little sofa. It was so unfair of the weather to make her a prisoner in her own apartment! Earlier the rain had been absolutely sheeting down, and she did not even dare to venture the short distance to mass.

Time went by. She picked up a book and tried to read, only to throw it aside in annoyance. Neither embroidery nor knitting charmed her, and she was not yet desperate enough to turn to the darning that had been sitting in her work basket for a fortnight. The ticking of the clock on the mantel drummed upon her nerves; she was surprised to find that she did not relish the quiet more, surrounded as she constantly was by people during her working life. Had she been in the middle of a chaotic rehearsal, she knew she would have longed for peace, but now that she was alone she found the silence unsettling, an absence of sound rather than a welcome respite. Briefly she considered practising Rosalinde, as her maestro had insisted she learn the part, but decided that her neighbours, no doubt likewise confined to the house, would probably not appreciate an impromptu operatic recital.

Humming, she tried to concentrate on her book once more, but the music in her mind, once awoken, would not leave her alone. Dropping _The Woman in White_ onto the sofa, she jumped up and went to find her galoshes. There was one person she knew who would be glad to see her, and, moreover, not be bothered by the rain...

* * *

><p><em>Drip<em>.

_Drip_.

_Drip_.

Irritated, Erik slammed his hands down on the piano keys, the discordant jangle that was produced echoing around the underground house. When the devil was it going to stop raining? All day he had been forced to listen to it, drumming on the drains and sloshing about in the sewers that surrounded his home. The noise had become such a constant that he found himself unconsciously weaving a musical interpretation of its pitter-patter into his sonata. Realising now that he had done so for the fifth time, he snatched up his pen and scrubbed out two whole staves of work. Then he petulantly threw the green quill across the room, inordinately pleased with himself when it scored a direct hit on a large Chinese vase, spinning around on the lip like a top before toppling inside with a clink.

Erik frowned for a moment when it dawned on him that the vase was deep and narrow, and he was likely to get his arm stuck if he tried to retrieve the pen, but then he decided that the diversion such a quest was likely to provide would probably be worth the discomfort. And he definitely needed a distraction – if he kept working like this he was likely to end up with the monotonous sound of the world's first symphony for raindrops in puddles and that would never do.

Stretching his cramped muscles, he rose from the piano stool and tried to work the kinks out of his shoulders. He had no idea how long he'd been writing, lost in the music – time was difficult to keep track of when you lived five cellars below ground – but as there was no noise from above he deduced it must be Sunday, the only day of the week that his poor, tortured ears were granted a respite from the cacophonous screeching of La Carlotta. Normally he would enjoy the peace, but the constant dripping of the rain put paid to that.

Now that he was on his feet he reasoned that he might as well make a cup of tea, and ambled off towards the kitchen with that intention. As he did, his keen hearing picked up a new sound, an accompaniment to the raindrops and the gentle splash of the lake against the rock outside. Something metallic was clattering in the distance, repeatedly, rattling and scraping. Erik groaned as he realised that it must be the gate that secured the Rue Scribe entrance to the tunnels. The wind had probably worked the catch loose, and if he didn't go and do something about it come tomorrow morning he might find all kinds of flotsam from the Parisian streets on his doorstep. Knowing well what it was like to be an outcast Erik would not deny them shelter in principle, but an Opera Ghost needed his privacy.

Setting the kettle aside, he quickly donned hat and cloak and made his way towards the surface. The noise from the rain was much, much worse up there, and the continual dripping set his teeth on edge as well as shivers along his spine when water ran down the back of his neck. A veritable river wound its way under the railings and down the passageway, and soon his feet were wet through as well. As he neared the iron gate the wind rattled it ferociously, fit to break the rusting hinges, and drove cold, needle-sharp droplets into his face. For once in his life, he was glad of the protection afforded by his mask.

He took hold of the gate and shook it, hard, several times – the lock was holding but one of the bolts looked as though it might be coming loose. Erik cursed his lack of foresight in neglecting to bring any tools with him. Now he would have to make the trek back down to the house and return, getting even wetter than he already was in the process. He swore, twice, and turned, sloshing through the rushing water to go back the way he had come.

As he did, he heard a footstep, a splash in a puddle out in the street, and froze. Swiftly, instinctively, he slid into the shadows, his hand reaching for the thin, coiled length of rope at his side. Beyond the gate a figure, huddled in a thick cloak, appeared from the gloom, indistinct against the driving rain. It stopped, fumbled for a moment in the bag on its shoulder, and then, to Erik's surprise, produced a key which it inserted into the lock. As the gate creaked open, just before he made ready to release the Punjab lasso, he recognised the little hands, trembling with cold, which held the key.

"Christine?" he called softly.

She jumped, and peered out from under her hood. "Erik? Oh, how you startled me! What are you doing here?"

"I should be asking you the same question, my dear. This is hardly the weather to be gallivanting about town – its effects could be disastrous for your voice. Look at you – you are soaked to the skin!"

"It's not as bad as it appears," she said, ducking into the tunnel and shaking out her cloak. "I had to walk for three streets before I could find a cab. I'm quite dry underneath. Well, most of me," she added, glancing ruefully at the sodden hem of her skirt.

Erik tsked and ushered her ahead of him down the passage. "Even so, we cannot have you catching a cold. Mademoiselle Durant would have to attempt _Mein Herr Marquis_, and that is a prospect my nerves could not stand. Come along."

* * *

><p>The house by the lake, though chilly, was dry, much to Christine's relief.<p>

Erik apologised for the only fire being lit in the music room, explaining that he had not been expecting guests. That much was obvious, Christine thought as she took note of the teetering piles of manuscript paper which covered the piano and the overflowing waste paper basket beside it. Taking her cloak and spreading it over a chair to dry, he hurried off to fetch more fuel for the blaze and insisted she take the seat closest to the hearth.

"Won't you sit down, too?" she asked, pulling off her boots and standing them on the rug. Erik had not even removed his hat, and it seemed that he was even wetter than her if the squelching sounds his feet made when he moved were anything to go by.

"In a moment," he said, and disappeared from the room.

With a sigh, Christine held out her hands to the fire, marvelling at the existence of such a thing so far below ground. More than once she had wondered exactly where the flue from the chimney went and how the smoke reached the outside world, but she had not yet managed to steer the conversation round to the subject. Erik always had something far more interesting to talk about.

She heard him boiling a kettle and then the sound of china clinking. Shortly afterwards he returned, minus hat and cloak and bearing a tea tray. He carried it across the room and set it on the table beside her chair, clearing away the dismembered parts of two flutes and a tuning fork; as he did, Christine realised that the crockery was rattling.

"Erik, you're shivering!" she exclaimed, jumping up.

"Erik is fine," came the reply, but his words were immediately belied by the chattering of his teeth.

Now it was Christine's turn to tsk. "You most certainly are not. Oh, look, you foolish man, you are still wearing those soaked boots!"

"It is nothing."

"Erik," said Christine, "you have shown concern for my health, now let me do the same. Sit down."

His mouth twitched in annoyance and his visible eyebrow arched, but he did as he was told and sank into his big wing-backed armchair. He looked tired, she thought, a dark smudge beneath his left eye speaking of several sleepless nights. For a moment his eyes drifted shut, but he sat up, startled, when she knelt down and began to unlace his boots.

"What are you doing?" he demanded.

"If you do not take them off, you will catch a chill," she told him, drawing on her best impersonation of Madame Giry and staring him down as she tugged off first one boot, and then the other. She reached for his damp stockings, but he pulled away sharply.

"I can manage." He looked uncomfortable, and would not move until she stood and crossed the room in search of dry clothing.

When she returned, carrying a pair of slippers, his oriental robe and a blanket, he was trying to hide his long, pale feet by tucking them under the chair; she gave him the dry things and turned her attention to the tea tray in order to afford him some privacy. By the time she handed him a cup, he had donned robe and slippers but the blanket was folded on the arm of the chair. Christine took it, shook it out and tucked it across his lap, much to his consternation.

"I am not an invalid or an old man!" he exclaimed.

Hiding a smile, she returned to her seat and regarded him over the rim of her own teacup. "Maybe not, but you _are_ exhausted and cold. If you do not rest you will be ill and then who will make sure that _Die Fledermaus _is not a complete disaster?"

It was precisely the right thing to say. Erik cared nothing for his own health, but when the fate of an opera was at stake, even one which was a farce to begin with...

Before he could answer, however, there was the sound of something rattling and creaking in the distance. It set Christine's teeth on edge, as though someone were drawing their fingernails down a blackboard. Erik groaned.

"The gate... I forgot to secure it."

"Leave it. I am not allowing you to go up there again."

His eyebrow rose again in brief amusement at her tone, before he shook his head. "If I do not do something it could come completely off its hinges and I have no desire to leave the tunnels open to intrusion. You will have to excuse me for a while, I am afraid – I'm sure you can find something in the library with which to occupy yourself in my absence." He made to rise from the chair, but Christine had already jumped up and put a hand on his shoulder.

"You are not going anywhere," she told him sternly. "Tell me what to do, and I will go."

Mismatched eyes flashed and his face creased in a frown. "Absolutely not. I will not have you ruining your voice by catching a cold."

"I will be fine. My cloak is almost dry and I have risked my voice already by travelling here. If I am going to catch a cold I will do so anyway – one more trip into the rain will make little difference." She met his gaze with a determined one of her own. It was stalemate for several moments before Erik sighed and sank back against the cushions of the chair.

"Oh, very well. There is rope in the hall cupboard, and be sure to cover your throat..."

* * *

><p>The gate was rattling against the tunnel wall when Christine eventually made it to the Rue Scribe entrance. The noise was horrible, and she could understand why it needed to be secured – if the metallic screeching did not drive them mad it might attract the attention of passersby. Once someone had found the passages beneath the opera house, their curiosity would naturally lead them to want to explore and that would be disastrous for Erik.<p>

Awkwardly, somewhat hampered by the extra layers he had insisted she wear, Christine managed to lash the gate shut, tying it as tightly as she could with almost frozen hands. The rain was still coming down in torrents, and by the time she had finished her cloak was soaking wet once more. Thankfully her galoshes kept her feet warm and dry as she splashed through the water that ran under the gate; she lifted up her skirts to stop them trailing in the little river and kicked like a child jumping in puddles. A mischievous grin turned her lips as she thought that Erik would most definitely not approve.

By the time she reached the house by the lake she was considerably wetter than on her journey from home. Letting herself in, she went to her room to change into a dry gown and carried her drenched garments through to the music room where the fire was still burning. It was not until she had laid out her clothes to dry once more and stirred the coals with the poker that she realised Erik had made no comment upon her return. As she turned from the hearth to face his chair she realised why: he had fallen asleep.

She had never seen him sleep before. Incredibly for the feared Phantom of the Opera he looked quite innocent, almost childlike, the lines of care and age on the visible side of his face smoothed away. He had unconsciously curled up in the chair, his loose limbs drawn inward and one hand tucked under his chin. Smiling fondly, Christine picked up the blanket from where it lay crumpled on the floor and laid it over him. On an impulse which dared her to do something she would never attempt when he was awake, she dropped a kiss on his forehead.

"Sweet dreams, my angel," she whispered, and retreated to her own chair to watch the flames and dance in the grate and wait until he woke.

As the warmth of the room lulled her towards slumber as well, she decided that the rain could stay forever if it meant that she could spend every day like this.


End file.
